How Does Steinbeck Use Power In Of Mice And Men

Of Mice and Men is a book written by John Steinbeck. Power, and how it is used is very important in the book. In this essay I am going to be talking about how the characters, themes, and symbols and how people's weaknesses in the novel ar exploited and how this is all related to the concept of power. One of the themes of power is when Carlson decides he’s had enough of Candy’s dog smelling up the place and decides to take it out to shoot it. Now, Candy is an old man that is missing a hand so he is considered too weak to stop Carlson from taking his dog out and shooting it. This is an example of someone exerting their power over someone that is weaker. Another example of power is Lennie’s physical power. He doesn’t think he is as strong as he is and he ends up killing mice from stroking them too hard. He also ends up killing his puppy because he thought it was about to bite him so he was going to give it a little slap but it ended up being hard enough to kill it because he didn’t know he was that strong. Lennie’s strength also caused him to kill Curley's wife. He had one hand grabbing her hair and he had another hand on her mouth trying to get her to be quiet and he accidentally snapped her neck when she shook her.

Crooks is the only African-American on the ranch and in the 1930’s people weren’t very nice to African-Americans. Crooks is the stable buck. He isn’t allowed to come in the bunkhouse with the rest of the men so he has his own room in the barn. He gets very lonely in there. Curley's wife also ends up going on a big rant at him about how she could get rid of him so easy and no one would care. Speaking of Curley's wife, she is another person that is lower in social power. She is the only woman on the ranch and she is also very lonely. Even the fact that she is just called “Curley's wife” is a huge symbol of how she doesn’t have much power. She is never called by her actual name once in the whole